Peter Kirby

Where can I find a list of the dates for the Old Testament books? Online or in print? It is ok if the dates are in terms of centuries.

Any info on the dating of the Jewish pseudepigrapha would be a bonus.

Any sources are welcome; I can compare and evaluate myself.

best,
Peter Kirby

Vorkosigan

Peter --

I was thinking about this and the only thing that leapt to mind -- How about the Encyclopedia Britannica online? The articles all give dates for each of the OT books. They tend to be solid conservative scholarship.

Michael

Peter Kirby

Hi Michael,

Thanks for the idea. I then thought of the Jewish Encyclopedia:

<a href="http://jewishencyclopedia.com/index.jsp" target="_blank">http://jewishencyclopedia.com/index.jsp</a>

But it would be useful to have additional references as well that would be more up to date. So I am still taking suggestions.

best,
Peter Kirby

Apikorus

Peter, due to the conflate nature of many of the books of the Hebrew Bible, it is not possible to assign a unique date of composition in many cases. For example, the P and non-P sections of Genesis may be separated in time by several centuries. The Deuteronomistic History itself is highly layered, and there is no universally agreed-upon way to peel the onion. (For a recent attempt, see the book by Campbell and O'Brien.)

Isaiah 1-39 is an accretion of material from 8th - 6th centuries BCE, while Isa 40-55 is conventionally assigned an early postexilic dating. (Though see the recent Hermeneia commentary by Baltzer, who argues for a much later date of ca. 400 BCE.) Daniel 1-6 may contain some authentic Persian era material, but Dan 8-12 is clearly Hasmonean. Zechariah 9-14 weren't written by the author of Zech 1-8. Same goes for Proverbs 1-9 vis-a-vis Prov 10-31. The Psalter are all over the temporal map.

Even texts which are coherent, single-author products (more or less) such as Jonah, Ruth, and Song of Songs are of hotly debated provenance. On the other hand, it is pretty well accepted that Hosea, Amos, and Micah date to the 8th c. BCE.

In short, any list that has books of the HB in one column and dates of composition in another is likely to be of dubious utility. If you are interested in reading up on the provenance of individual books, I'd suggest looking up articles on those particular books in the Anchor Bible Dictionary. If you have a question about a specific book, I would be happy to tell you what I know.

P.S. One nice place to start would be a dated but still useful book by Gerald Larue, entitled "Old Testament Life and Literature", which I believe is available online here at the II library. Another book you may find useful is Norman Gottwald's The Hebrew Bible: A Socio-Literary Introduction.

[ September 22, 2002: Message edited by: Apikorus ]</p>

Pantera

<a href="http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/gerald_larue/otll/index.shtml" target="_blank">It is indeed</a>

PS Welcome back Apikorus! Haven't seen you around for a while.

Clarice O'C

Hi Peter,

Walter Mattfeld's research, based on archaeological findings, which date, book by book, the "Primary History" (Genesis - 2 Kings) is found at the following URL:
<a href="http://www.bibleorigins.net/archaeologydatestexts.html" target="_blank">http://www.bibleorigins.net/archaeologydatestexts.html</a>

For arguments that the Primary History was composed ca. 562 BCE in the Babylonian Exile cf. the following URL:
<a href="http://www.bibleorigins.net/PrimaryHistory562BCE.html" target="_blank">http://www.bibleorigins.net/PrimaryHistory562BCE.html</a>

Walter wrote to me, "I understand that the books of the prophets are in most cases, older than
the Primary History. Besides using archaeology to date the texts I also employ "failed Prophecies" as well, cf.":
<a href="http://www.bibleorigins.net/FailedPropheciesDateTexts.html" target="_blank">http://www.bibleorigins.net/FailedPropheciesDateTexts.html</a>

If you have questions you could write to Walter who is gracious with his help.

Best,
Clarice

Boshko

also a very good case can be made that the bulk of the OT (and certainly later bits like Daniel) were written (or at least heavily edited) under the Maccabes...

Apikorus

Naw, that dog won't hunt. This hyperminimalist "the Hebrew Bible is Hellenistic" stuff is utterly untenable. For starters, you've got some fairly extensive corroboration of Judahite and Israelean kings and battles in the Assyrian annals - from Iron II. Minimalists like Thompson, Davies, Lemche, et al. who wish to defend a Hellenistic provenance of the DH should readily be able to identify elements therein which reflect Hellenistic cultural institutions, the poleis, Hellenistic philosophy, Graecisms in the text itself, multiethnicity of Hellenistic Palestine, etc. They can't.

That Daniel 7-12 is Hasmonean has been known since Porphyry.

[ September 23, 2002: Message edited by: Apikorus ]</p>

Plebe

<a href="http://www.askwhy.co.uk/judaism/index.html#Is%20Dating%20Phony%20Too?" target="_blank">http://www.askwhy.co.uk/judaism/index.html#Is%20Dating%20Phony%20Too?</a>
I just found this link listed under another thread titled "Zoroastrianism" I have not reviewed it yet, but it has some interesting ideas as regards the creation and dating of the OT/Talmud. Let us know what you think about the info. there since you seem more well read than most! Thanks.

Simon Magus

In his widely available book, "Who Wrote the Bible?", Richard Friedmann gives an account of the Documentary Hypothesis of the authorship of the Pentateuch, and establishes rough estimates as to what time period each redactor and contributor to the Pentateuch would have operated in. It is all fairly scholarly stuff, written for a lay open-minded audience.